The offer is too good to pass up. “I’m in,” I say.
Connie pours me a drink and I carry my book outside to read. I fail. Julie and Connie take over the silence with layer on layer of jokes and gossip.
They argue about some elaborate card trick they remember from a television special they watched in their dorm room. Connie produces a deck of cards. Her attempt at the trick fails again and again. I’m convinced I can pull it off. I can’t. Nothing has ever been funnier. We shift to several hands of gin rummy. Then we play a round of a more violent game I’ve never heard of. I never quite wrap my mind around the rules. Connie wins. When we look up, the sun is already descending into a pink smear at the tree line.
“How are we at the end of this day already?” Julie asks. It has been so long since time has passed quickly and easily.
We decide to walk the mile to dinner. We’ll sober up while we stroll. We’ll fill ourselves with tacos for the walk home. “Are there actually sidewalks all the way there?” I ask.
“Yes. This place is in that strip mall with the urgent-care clinic and the bakery. I walked over there this morning actually.”
Julie and I disappear to change our clothes. Julie slips on a dress amplified by a floral print. “How do I look?”
“Like a svelte garden,” I say. I know she’ll like that.
“How do you feel?”
“Mostly, I feel those drinks. They feel terrific. You?”
“Yes, it seems right to be away from that place.”
“So let’s sell it,” I say, as if it were an easy thing to do. “Let’s rent an apartment and get out of there until someone wants to take it off our hands.”
“Don’t you think we got such a good deal on it because it’s a hard house to sell? The bank owned it for years.”
“So, let’s make it our project. We’ll fix it up. Install new plaster in the basement to get rid of that stain. Replace all those old windows. We could put new cabinets in the kitchen. We probably need to stay in the house while we do it, but it’ll be over quickly. We’ll be free.”
“You make it sound so simple, James, but I really don’t think it is.”
“Maybe we can make it easy. Maybe we’re part of the problem. Maybe we’re letting ourselves believe it’s out of our control.”
“If that’s the case, then we should stay and stop being so paranoid.” Julie is always reading into what I say.
“No, we know we want to get rid of the house. Let’s do it. Maybe we can try to think more rationally if the situation is temporary, though. We don’t have to let it get to us.”
Julie looks skeptical and then notices I am still in my T-shirt and shorts. “Aren’t you changing?”
“Yes.” I jump up. I pull my shirt out of my bag.
“Ready, ladies?” Connie calls from outside the door.
“Uno momento por favor!” I shout.
Julie grabs her purse. She squeezes out. “What’s this place called?” I hear her ask Connie.
“Mataviejitas. That’s what they call their margarita.”
Julie laughs.
I emerge. “Mataviejitas? Accessing my high school Spanish … beep boop bop … Old Lady Killer? Is that right?”
I catch the grimace on Connie’s face as I start down the stairs.
“I think so. Too grim? At least it’s not Old Man Killer.”
Julie winces.
Connie asks, “Do you want to go somewhere else? There’s a bar in the other direction that serves tapas.”
“Don’t be silly. I’d like to take my old ladies to meet their maker. How do I look?” At the bottom of the stairs, I do a sloppy spin. I catch myself on the banister.
Connie’s eyes go wide. “Very smooth. Maybe you skip the next round, pal.”
I bow deeply.
Julie rubs my back. “You look very handsome, James. You could have given your hair a comb, but this is definitely an improvement.”
“I can brush my hair! I’ll be back down in two shakes. Why don’t you ladies get a head start? I’ll catch up.”
Julie shoots me a look. She feels guilty for having made this request. She’s not stopping me, though.
When I appear at the front door a minute later, they’ve only made it to the sidewalk. Connie says, “Let’s skedaddle. I don’t want to have to wait for a table.”
“Connie, don’t I need to lock this?” I ask.
“Nah, I don’t usually.”
“Live dangerously,” I say. Connie’s Christmas tree lies on the parkway waiting to be picked up. “Trash service is no good over here, huh?”
“Friends, that had clearly been in my house for over five months, and I would like to thank you both for staying here because otherwise it would have stuck around until next Christmas.”
We walk along a park dense with trees. We can see through to a clearing with a huge playground. No children play on the slides, swings, monkey bars. A couple of mothers with strollers are planted beneath a huge tree. They stare up. “Come down now,” one calls. Whatever is in that tree doesn’t respond.
“Wait up, ladies!” I shout. I jog ahead. I squeeze both their shoulders.
“Ah!” Julie grunts. Her hand goes to her neck.
“Come on, I didn’t grab it that hard!”
She pulls back the corner of her sweater. The edge of another bruise is already feathering into view.
63
AT THE END of the meal, Connie insists on examining the new bruise, asks me to summarize the latest results from the doctors, which amount to not much insight at all, and then counters, “I think you should get a second opinion.”
“I know and I will.” I reach over to clasp James’s hand for a moment before excusing myself to go to the bathroom.
I still feel followed, as if instead of the house’s being haunted, the haunting has crawled into me, and I want to turn the tale as James had said, so that I believe both that we are lucky and that nothing matters, but it’s so hard not to believe myself. I wash my hands and I try to stare behind my eyes into the mirror, and I check all the other stalls, sure I’m not alone, but it’s just me in there.
I navigate back to the table. “Are we about ready?”
We pay the bill and head out. The small mass of us shifts as we walk. When lawns border the sidewalk, James walks in the grass beside Connie and me. When the buildings and fences crowd in, he falls behind. When we pass someone, we form a single-file line and then reswarm.
On Connie’s block, I say, “Have you noticed that return trips always take less time? Like didn’t the walk home feel so much shorter than the walk to the restaurant?”
“It’s all about perception,” James says. “We were hungry. You and I weren’t sure of where we were going. Now, we’re full and drunk. We know the way.”
“I know. I didn’t think that it actually took less time,” I say. “But it feels like it does. Are you guys up for watching a movie tonight?”
“Sure.” Connie pushes open the door. “Whatever you want, chickadees.”